//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1: Fluttery Wings 
// Story: Song of the Deep 
// by Cloudy_Quartz_Cakes 
//------------------------------//

“The hippogriffs?”
The young colt nodded at his daycare teacher, A light yellow unicorn in her early 30’s with curly blue and yellow hair like cotton candy, along with big round glasses with a pink frame.
“Well let me tell you all a story…”,she said mysteriously, intending to intrigue the young foals sitting around her.
She took out some little figures and a colorful map of equestria to catch the kids' eye.
“Does everypony see that strange small mountain in the sea?”
Some of the foals nodded, just excited to get to the good part.
“That’s mount Aris! That is where the hippogriffs lived after the war that was fought against the Storm king, an evil creature who even betrayed his own loyalists!”
The teacher cleared her throat.
“What do they look like Ms. Rosa?” said the same colt that had originally asked about the hippogriffs.
“Well,” she stuttered a bit embarrassed by the fact she hadn’t made it clear earlier, “they are like griffins but with horse parts instead of lion parts.”
The daycare teacher shows a small stone figure decorated by shiny shell shards.
“This is a small statue I have of a hippogriff, this was made by real hippogriffs you know!” Rosa exclaims proudly as if it were an ancient treasure that she had found in a temple instead of in a cheap artifact market.
By that point the fillies and colts had lost interest and carried on with their own things, playing with each other's manes or the loose strings on the carpet. The teacher packed up the map and the figures and sighed, adjusting her glasses with one hoof.


“Alright time for recess everypony.”
The foals jumped up excitedly and trotted happily to the city park in a messy line controlled as best as possible by Ms. Rosa. They laughed and yelled and kicked up the dirt playfully to make dusty clouds before they arrived at the park. The public park was used as a recess ground due to the lack of room for any more school property. The park lie in the middle of a dense trading city named the Farlens. It was a lush patch of land with big green flowering trees, bushes, and grass, very much contradicting the city around it which was dusty, dirty and buzzing with merchants and traders along with the general public, sometimes including over enthusiastic tourists from canterlot.
Ms. Rosa sat down on a dry patch of grass to take a rest, already exhausted from herding the foals around at the difficulty level of herding cats. She unwrapped her peanut butter and jelly sandwich. The sandwich was rather dry and the peanut butter sticky, but it was eaten regardless, because complaining wasn’t an option with such little money. She stood back up after finishing her lunch and directed her students back towards the school gates. The foals sat back down expressing obvious disappointment using body language due to the end of their recess. 
“Story time everypony! Gather on the reading carpet and we will choose a story to read!”
A filly raised her hand frantically and called out before Ms. Rosa had allowed her to speak.
“Ms. Rosa, where is Sugar Pine?”
The teacher’s eyes widened. She quickly went to the jacket rack and snatched her oversized beaver brown coat. Right after that she quickly scribbled a note and handed it to a colt.
“Alright class, please go to the art room and give Ms. Grape Vine this note, I have to go for today. Make sure to listen to her and have fun!” She stuttered nervously.
As the rest of her students exited the classroom she quickly opened the door and bolted out, barely remembering to lock it.


Ms. Rosa walked out onto the streets and called the filly’s name repetitively.
“Sugar Pine! Sugar Pineee!” 
In return to her calls she got nothing but the clinking of coins and the trotting of hooves in the voluminous marketplace. She ghosted around the city more nervously, asking random ponies walking by if they had seen a light green filly with a 
yellowish brown mane. 


“She can’t have gone that far!” Ms. Rosa gasped as she slowed down to catch her breath. 
The fluttering of little wings at once caught her eye in the big crowd a few meters away, the flutters looked desperate, like a bee that had fallen into water, trying to get out so it wouldn't drown. Ms. Rosa Pushed through the crowd, apologizing for each pony she’d run into or pushed to the side while trying her hardest to get to the fluttery wings. As she got close she saw some young stallions teasing the foal she had been looking for, Sugar Pine, stepping on her tail and laughing as they 
kicked dust on her with their hooves. 


“Let me go you big meanies!” she yelled at the young stallion stepping on her tail. 
One of the stallions held the pink bag she’d always carry around, waving it just out of her reach with his magic, teasing her. It had blue and yellow flowers depicted on the sides and one broken handle ripped by constant use. Ms. Rosa hesitated, scared herself that they could hurt her if she stepped in. 
“Guard! Guard!” Ms. Rosa yelled. The stallions noticed her and soon saw a guard wiggling through the crowd with a long metal bat. 
“Return this young lady’s bag immediately or suffer the consequences of the law!” The earth pony guard said in a raised voice. The guard lifted his bat ready to strike the stallion with the bag that still remained in the grip of his magic. Ms. Rosa quickly held Sugar Pine back and pushed the young filly behind her protectively. The young dusty stallions ran away, except for the one with the bag, letting the others escape due to there being only one guard available for the time being. The Stallion looked strangely calm. He held the bag in front of himself to protect himself from the possible hit. The Strongly built earth pony positioned himself to hit knowing that a bag wouldn’t protect the stallion from a painful bone breaking blow. Suddenly the bag moved. A tiny hoof poked out and went back in and there was a small whimpery squeak. The guard immediately stopped and lowered his bat, finally understanding the meaning behind the Stallion’s confidence. 
“If you hit me I will get hurt but you can’t harm me without hitting the small one first, most likely shattering her spine and killing her.” 
Ms. Rosa Froze imagining the whole situation. 
“Either that or you let me off the hook, eh?” The stallion said with a smirk. Ms. Rosa sat there in shock sitting on Sugar Pine’s tail so she wouldn’t run off or try anything dangerous. Ms. Rosa kept her eyes sharp on the two, the guard staring daggers at the young Stallion. Sugar pine came to see that Ms. Rosa’s attention towards her was in fact obscured by the conflict, so she looked at her tail and started gnawing on it, cutting a few patches of hair off at a time half way down her tail. She eventually managed to gnaw her tail in half separating her from the part of her tail Ms. Rosa sat on. Sugar pine scraped the remains of the hair in her mouth off with her hoof and wiped her hoof on Ms. Rosa, which was met with a disgusted reaction by her teacher, distracting her from the fact that Sugar Pine had already escaped. Sugar pine flew up angrily, her small wings fluttering like those of a beetle. She flew towards the stallion and attacked the stallion’s face like an angry Magpie. No damage was caused by her hooves but the stallion got annoyed enough to drop the bag and attempt to catch the filly out of anger.
“Come here you little rat!” he yelled after her as he started following her recklessly through the crowd, knocking down many of the ponies in his way. 


“Sugar Pine NO!” Ms. Rosa yelled knowing subconsciously that Sugar Pine wouldn’t listen. 
Ms. Rosa Quickly picked up the bag with her magic and ran after the guard who ran after the stallion, who ran after Sugar Pine. Sugar Pine took a hard right into an alleyway, a dead end. The stallion ran into it as well, only realizing that it was a dead end when his face came a meter in front of the wall. Sugar Pine sat on the top of the wall looking down at him, smiling like he had smiled at her before, which made the stallion angry. Realizing that the filly had trapped him he quickly jerked his head around to run off, and instead was met by the guard's bat hitting the joints of his front legs backwards.